Page 35 (1/1)

He grio Whatever the Maidens did to her, Isendre certainly had co Just not for this She had entered the Waste with Hadnan Kadere, but Kadere had not cracked his teeth when the Maidens took her for stealing the jewelry that was now all they let her wear It had been all Rand could do to keep her frooat, or else dispatched naked toward the Dragonith one water bag; watching her plead for mercy once she realized what the Maidens intended, he had not been able to make himself stay out of it Once he had killed a woman; a woman who meant to kill him, but the memory still burned He did not think he would ever be able to do it again, even with his life in the balance A foolish thing, with fe his blood or worse, but there it was And if he could not kill a woman, how could he stand by and let a woman die? Even if she deserved it?

That was the rub In any land west of the Dragonwall, Isendre would face the gallows or the headsman’s block for what he knew about her About her, and Kadere, and probably most of the merchant’s men if not all They were Darkfriends And he could not expose them Not even they were aware that he knew

If any one of them was revealed as a Darkfriend Isendre endured as best she could, because even being a servant and kept naked was better than being tied hand and foot and left for the sun, but none would keep silent once Moiraine had her hands on them Aes Sedai had no more mercy for Darkfriends than for anyone else; she would loosen their tongues in short order And Asons, too, just another Darkfriend so far as Kadere and the others knew, though one with authority No doubt they thought he had taken service with the Dragon Reborn on orders froher power To keep his teacher, to keep Moiraine fro to kill both of them very probably, Rand had to keep their secret

Luckily, no one questioned why the Aiel kept such a close watch on the ht it was the usual Aiel suspicion of outsiders in the Waste,in Rhuidean; she had had to use all of her persuasion to ons into the city The suspicion was there; Rhuarc and the other chiefs likely would have set guards even if Rand had not asked And Kadere just seeh his ribs

Rand had no idea hoas going to resolve the situation Or if he could It was a fine ht in a cleft stick like this

Once she was sure that he was not going to try to interfere further, Aviendha turned her attention back to the other woracefully to set the tray beside his pallet, a peculiar grinize an atte the Aiel woman see

"And now you will run to the first Maiden you can find," Aviendha went on, "and tell her what you have done Run, sorda!" Moaning and wringing her hands, Isendre ran in a great rattle of jewelry As soon as she was out of the roo to Elayne! You have no right to try luring any woasped "You think I --? Believe me, Aviendha, if she were the last woman on earth, I’d still stay as far from her as I could run"

"So you say" She sniffed "She has been switched seven ti to sneak to your bed She would not persist like that without soement She faces Far Dareis Mai justice, and she is no concern of even the Car’a’carn Take that as your lesson for today on our custo to et a word in, she stalked out wearing such a look that he thought Isendreout a long breath, he got up long enough to put the tray and its wine in a corner of the rooht him

Seven times she’s tried to reach me? She must have learned that he interceded for her; no doubt to her way of thinking, if he illing to do that for a sht he do forcold He would rather have a scorpion in his bed If the Maidens failed to convince her, he ht tell her what he knew about her; that should put an end to any sche the lamps, he crawled onto his pallet in the dark, still booted and fully dressed, and fumbled around until he had pulled all of the blankets over hirateful to Aviendha beforethe wards of Spirit that shielded his dreams from intrusion was almost automatic to him now, but even as he did it, he chuckled to hiotten into bed and then put out the las that he never thought of doing with the Power

For a ti for his body’s heat to warm the inside of the blankets How the saht was beyond hiered the halfhealed scar on his side That wound, the one that Moiraine could never completely Heal, ould kill him, eventually He was sure of it His blood on the rocks of Shayol Ghul That hat the Prophecies said

Not tonight I won’t think of that tonight I have a little time yet But if the seals can be shaved with a knife, now, do they still hold as strongly? No Not tonight

The inside of the blankets was beco and failing to find a coht drowsily Egas probably in a warht that minute Half the time he used one, a fistful of Maidens tried to co when he insisted on the to undress and dress in the steam

Sleep finally came, and with it, safely protected dreams, safe from the Wise Ones or anyone else Not protected froh Three women invaded thehtmare that nearly woke him By turns he dreaether Only Elayne had ever looked at him as a man, but all three saw hihtmare, they were all pleasant drea the Wise Ones

Standing as close as she could to the swene still shivered as she poured water froenerous teakettle into a wide, bluestriped bowl She had lowered the sides of the tent, but cold seeped through the colorful layered rugs covering the ground, and all the fire’s heat seemed to rush up and out of the s only the s He